This Week I Learned - Week #34 2024

This Week I Learned -  

* DuckDB is a  fast in-process analytical database. Data stored in the DuckDB takes less memory than there file format equivalent (CSV, JSON, etc …)

* Created in 2018, DuckDB supports various data formats and sources, offering a real analytics database with a SQL dialect. It simplifies and speeds up data analytics without the need for extensive infrastructure. 

* The free Data Wrangler extension offers data viewing and cleaning directly in VS Code and the Jupyter extension. It provides a rich UI to view and analyze your data, show visualizations, automatically generate Pandas code.

* Amazon hired most of the staff of agentic-AI specialist Adept AI in a move that echoes Microsoft’s absorption of Inflection. Google similarly has hired Character.AI’s co-founders and other employees and paid an undisclosed sum for nonexclusive rights to use Character.AI’s technology.

* Character.AI builds chatbots that mimic personalities from history, fiction, and popular culture. Character.AI co-founders Daniel De Freitas and Noam Shazeer, both of whom worked for Google prior to founding Character.AI in late 2021, returned. They brought with them 30 former members of Character.AI’s research team (out of roughly 130 employees) to work on Google Deep Mind’s Gemini model. - The Batch

* Verizon India was established a year after the formation of Verizon Communications in 2000, which resulted from the merger between Bell Atlantic and GTE. It has consistently expanded its workforce and plans to increase it by 15% in 2024. Currently, it employs approximately 3,200 individuals in Chennai, 3,100 in Hyderabad, and the remainder in Bengaluru. The India GCC, which started out as an IT backend support hub, has grown to play a crucial role in R&D, data analytics, customer support as well as developing cutting-edge solutions for its 5G network and enabling new applications based on technologies such as GenAI.

* Google Search now includes Indian English pronunciation guidance alongside British and American accents -

* Microsoft Edge's Split Screen Tabs feature allows you to view two web pages or even two parts of the same page side by side.

* Solace Health connects patients with healthcare professionals who help them negotiate an increasingly complex medical system. According to their website FAQ, their patient "advocate can assist with any healthcare headache, from scheduling appointments to helping with paperwork, communicating with your medical team and talking to your insurance plan. They ensure smooth navigation of your healthcare journey for as long as you need."

* An obsession with consuming only 'clean' foods has given rise to a new disorder known as orthorexia.

* Acetate eyeglass frames are stronger, more flexible, and more durable than regular plastic frames. Acetate is a type of high-quality plastic made from renewable sources like wood pulp and cotton fibers, which gives it superior properties compared to standard plastics. Additionally, due to its durability and better aesthetics, acetate frames are generally more expensive than standard plastic frames.

* Both polycarbonate and high-index materials provide thinner lenses for eyeglasses. Polycarbonate lenses are ten times more impact-resistant than glass or traditional plastic lenses. High-index lenses bend light more efficiently than other eyeglass lens types because of their higher refraction index, making them lighter and thinner compared to polycarbonate lenses.

* A reversible poem, also called a palindrome poem or a reverso poem, is a poem that can be read both forwards and backwards, with a different meaning in each direction. Reversible poems are sometimes taught to students as a way of showing differing perspectives within the same words.

"Pretty Ugly", a reverse poem by Abdullah Shoaib

I’m very ugly

So don’t try to convince me that

I am a very beautiful person

Because at the end of the day

I hate myself in every single way

And I’m not going to lie to myself by saying

There is beauty inside of me that matters

So rest assured I will remind myself

That I am a worthless, terrible person

And nothing you say will make me believe

I still deserve love

Because no matter what

I am not good enough to be loved

And I am in no position to believe that

Beauty does exist within me

Because whenever I look in the mirror I always think

Am I as ugly as people say?

Now read the same words from bottom-up

* Mettukurinji (Strobilanthes sessilis) blooms every seven years at an elevation of 600 to 1000 metres above sea level, unlike Neelakurinji (Strobilanthes kunthiana), which blooms every 12 years. Idukki hills have turned blue as a result of this rare Mettukurinji bloom. 

* The National Medical Register (NMR) portal will maintain a comprehensive  database of all MBBS doctors in India, linked to their Aadhaar IDs for authenticity.

* Major stock market crashes in India happened in 2008, 2011, 2013 and 2020. In March 2020, the markets fell by 40%.

* Theobroma, the patisserie chain, is backed by ICICI Venture, which owns around 42 percent stake.

* There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. - Source ambiguous